Hi,
Can anyone recommend a KVM switch that works well with Linux? I have two PCs and one monitor keyboard and mouse.

If you have experience of a good KVM switch that allows 1920x1080 with an NVIDIA GPU and the latest drivers please let me know what model it is.

Thanks in advance.

Regards Steve

There's a wide range of choices. You need to specify monitor connection type: VGA, DVI, HDMI or DisplayPort (or RGB). Mouse and keyboard are presumably USB. Do you need to switch audio as well? Are you planning on upgrading to dual monitors or 4K in the near future? Simple switches have just a manual control on the box. More complex use a software control like a key combination or mouse click on a screen "hot spot". As long as you get compatible hardware and avoid the cheap junk any will work on Linux.

I used to use an ethernet-based KVM switch (I think it was Tripp Lite) to control a rack full of servers, but now I use VNC and have a window open on the server I need to get to. When your PC is 3 states away from the server rack this saves a lot on cable expenses.

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Hi,
Thanks for your reply. Of course you are right I should be more specific.
I need a hdmi based KVM that can switch keyboard, mouse, monitor and audio between two PCs. I think the hdmi might be cheaper than the display port versions, although I could be wrong. I won't be using dual monitors. As you say I will definitely be avoiding the cheap parts and focusing hopefully on known and reliable brands but at the moment I'm not sure which they are when it comes to Linux.
I currently have a DVI KVM switch but for reasons I think are related to the 'EDID' of the monitor not being picked up when using recent NVIDIA Linux drivers and DVI cables the maximum resolution is reduced from 1920x1080 with windows 10 to 1600x900 with Linux. Using a single hdmi cable to connect a single PC to the monitor doesn't seemt to produce the same problem with the NVIDIA drivers so I'm hoping that a hdmi KVM might work ok.


Regards Steve

I like my Belkin F1DN104B-3 - handles dual link properly, sends EDID (and spoofs a connection to the 'not selected' PCs so they don't drop their outputs), and has had no problem sending 120hz or 144hz video, 3D video, etc along with standard 1080p60 or 720p60. I'm sure you could dongle adapt it to HDMI if your devices require that, but you'd lose dual-link support (HDMI does not support dual-link). It has ports for audio but I've never hooked them up.

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I don't think that you really need to worry about OS compatibility for a KVM switch. It works at a much lower hardware level than the OS; the OS is pretty much irrelevant to its functioning.

That being said, I have an inexpensive IOGEAR Model GCS72U that has worked flawlessly for several years.

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I'd look for one that tells about the keep alive function.

The better ones tend to offer that feature.

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I, too, have used IOGEAR KVMs for several years. I had to replace the first one I had because it only supported PS2 connections. The replacement supports both PS2 and USB. It doesn't do sound, or HDMI.
So, I can't recommend a specific model, but highly recommend IOGEAR. As mentioned, it doesn't care what OS the connected computers are running.

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The switch is hardware, and knows nothing about the OS. Linux has nothing at all to do with it. 1920x1080 is comparatively low resolution, so any switch should be good enough. Long-term reliability could be an issue, though. But you can buy a cheap model and replace it a few times for the cost of a more expensive one. That's something only you can decide.

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Sadly, KVM behaviour is OS dependent. I have an 8 way Manhattan HDMI/USB KVM. It works fine with windows (10), and Ubuntu up to 19.04. From 19.10 until latest (22.10) it is broken and refuses to transmit keyboard/mouse information. I can take a 19.10 installation disc to try Ubuntu and boot it on known good hardware (eg one of the windows machines) and all the keyboard/mouse interaction is fine until linux starts. So, the BIOS etc works, but the linux kernel/drivers are bust. This appears to be a linux kernel fault; it's also in the latest RedHat amongst others. There are bugs raised to get it fixed but little interest.

Haven't used a kvm switch for years though back in the day it was useful with pc/at, ps/2, vga, etc and just one monitor...
Nowadays, I get around with it by using ssh and lately with xpra.